Agriculture as Industry: The Failure of Environmental and Agricultural Policy to Adapt to the Modern Agricultural Landscape

This article seeks to identify the biases that exist in the scheme
of regulatory and common law, and their resulting harms, and to understand the driving forces that have prevented these laws
from adapting to the changing agricultural landscape. Some of
these forces are clearly political and economic. However, it is
possible that certain social and cultural biases exist as well.
Agriculture appears to be deeply rooted in American ideology,
and it is this ideology that often allows certain protections to
extend not only to farmers like Lemire, but also to larger, more
industrial agricultural operations. As a result, modern,
commercial agricultural operations have, collectively, largely
escaped environmental regulation through exceptions not
similarly afforded to other industrial polluters.
Part I of this article will illustrate the ways in which agriculture has evolved into an industry and how agricultural policy and anti-regulation has promoted this shift. Part II will identify the biases in the federal and common law. Finally, Part III contains a discussion of extraneous factors such as cultural and historical ideology as it relates to agriculture, as they are additional pressures that contribute to the lack of adequate environmental regulation pertaining to agriculture.

Smoke and Mirrors: Preventing Deception of Consumers in the Tobacco Market Through Graphic Warning Labels

The Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act,
signed by President Obama on June 22, 2009, grants the FDA the
authority to regulate tobacco products, and further requires color
graphics depicting the negative health consequences of smoking
to be printed on tobacco products. No later than two years after
the date of enactment, graphic warning labels were supposed to
cover fifty percent of the front and rear of cigarette packaging,
and thirty percent of the display panels of smokeless tobacco
products. The images eventually developed by the FDA,
including a man smoking with a stoma in his neck, a cancerous
lesion on a lip, and an image of healthy lungs adjacent to diseased
lungs, have yet to appear on tobacco products, as a result of
litigation between the federal government and tobacco
companies.
Part I of this paper will look at the development of commercial free speech case law, highlighting that several federal circuit courts have
applied the lower level scrutiny of Zauderer to cases where there
is no deceptive advertisement, only a misconception in the market
surrounding a product or service. Part II will examine the rulings by the Sixth Circuit and the D.C. Circuit concerning the graphic warning label provision of the Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act.

A Bone to Pick: The Paleontological Resources Preservation Act and Its Effect on Commercial Paleontology

This article evaluates the soundness of the PRPA and its likely
effect on the Department of the Interior policies. Part I explains
the scientific importance of paleontological resources and why
they should be protected. Part II discusses how the United States
managed paleontological resources before the PRPA. Part III
explains the PRPA and the changes it will likely make to the
current permit systems. Potential problems are then discussed.
Part IV posits that the PRPA kept what was good about federal
fossil management, including the Bureau of Land Management’s
permit system, and made some improvements, including explicit
protections, policies, and penalties. However, the PRPA goes too
far in fossil protection at the expense of fossil proliferation. This
article advocates an amendment that would allow commercial
collectors to participate in the PRPA’s permit system, leading to
the preservation of more fossils for public enjoyment and
scientific research.

Scamming the Elderly: An Increased Susceptibility to Financial Exploitation Within and Outside of the Family

Abuse of the elderly is a growing, and often times hidden,
phenomenon which affects millions annually. “Elder abuse is
present in every community, at every income level and in every
social and cultural group.” It includes physical abuse, neglect,
self-neglect, and financial exploitation. Although the estimated
number of victims of elder abuse is high, there are no official
national statistics due to the varying definitions of elder abuse, as
well as the lack of a uniform reporting system throughout the
states. The National Center on Elder Abuse estimates that “for
every one case of elder abuse . . . [that is] reported to authorities,
about five more go unreported.”
Financial elder abuse has been classified by many scholars as
“‘the crime of the 21st century.’” The difficulty of detecting this
type of abuse suggests that it may be more prevalent than physical abuse. While many cases of financial exploitation of the
elderly go unreported, “the annual financial loss by victims of
elder financial abuse is estimated to be at least $2.6 billion.”
When financial abuse occurs, “the health, dignity, and
economic security of millions of older Americans” is breached and
sometimes there is no way to mend this injury. The cost of
financial exploitation surpasses that of the elderly victim’s
finances; it has also been estimated to cost Americans billions of
dollars annually, from healthcare costs to investigative and legal
costs. Unfortunately, financial elder abuse is a crime which is
“underreported, under-recognized, and under-prosecuted.”

Cathing Up: How the Youth Court Act Can Save New York State's Outdated Juvenille Justice System With Regard to Sixteen and Seventeen-Year-Old Offenders

New York State is one of only two states in the country that
classifies sixteen-year-olds as adults in the eyes of the court
system, an embarrassing distinction that the Office of Court
Administration and the New York State Legislature are eager to
change. The Chief Judge of the New York Court of Appeals has
introduced a proposal that would create a special court for sixteen
and seventeen-year-old nonviolent offenders—in a move that
would eventually raise the age of criminal liability in New York
to eighteen years old. The proposed measure, the Youth Court
Act, essentially blends the essential Due Process protections of
the criminal court system with that of the family court system.
The proceedings would seamlessly blend the procedural
safeguards evident in the criminal system with the rehabilitative
elements of family court; with the ultimate goal being a complete
shift to family court. In addition to the Court of Appeals, the
State Legislature has been working on enacting a bill that would
amend the Criminal Procedure Law, the Executive Law, the
Family Court Act, and the Penal Law to raise the age of criminal
responsibility for certain acts to eighteen. This bill, drafted by
the legislature, would go much further and, for various reasons, is
not a feasible option.
The first section of this paper will discuss the evolution of the
juvenile justice system in New York. The second section will
analyze various reasons for decreasing the criminal responsibility
of sixteen and seventeen-year-olds. The third section will
examine the proposal set forth by the Court of Appeals, a similar
bill currently before the State Legislature, the differences
between the two, and the roadblocks that both have faced.